I'm having a lot of fun with this challenge. Smeargle has actually been super awesome, and I've been using a SS Sweeper Gorebyss that people have not been enjoying. There are a lot of pokes in the -30's that people should really be using more.

Just posting to say that in my second game I used a team with Cresselia because I didn't see the rule about BL2, but it was just the one game and I lost anyway because of hax, so hopefully it's not a problem. If it helps any, karma struck and in my next two games (which i won) the ladder didnt update :(

Despite that, is anyone else finding your standard bulky water (Suicune, Blastoise, Milotic, etc..) more annoying than usual? I cant use Zapdos, Raikou, Roserade or Shaymin, which is probably why I'm appreciating Froslass' Spikes so much. I didn't remember what a pain they were until I lost my favorite switch ins to them

Lanturn is the answer to everything. I mostly wanted to use it because it's my favorite and I haven't had a reason to yet, but I'm loving the thing. Has only died to a Fake Out/Giga Impact Ambipom (WHY, HUMANITY, WHY). It and Xatu make a great defensive core, Heal Bell/Toxic/Scald/Volt Switch + T-Wave/Wish/Protect/U-Turn have already stalled out an entire team.

I also swept a team that had Light Screen, Reflect, and Trick Room up with a Speed Boost Yanmega (so far I think has killed about 15 things in 4 battles for me) because the opponent underestimated the power and tried to set up with Bisharp/Cofag. Kind of went downhill for them when Light Screen and Trick Room wore off on the same turn.

EDIT: I'm 17-2 thus far into the challenge. While I still have a provisional rating, once I play about 10 more battles or so, my rating puts me at #34 on the ladder. That's actually the most success I've gotten with any team on the ladder ever, much less a challenge team. Thank you challenges. Also, Lanturn remains a beast.

Sharpedo is a beast, Gligar is usable, Choice specs tinted lens yanmega tears holes, Rhyperior is solid. How are half of these not top 30? o.o

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Funny you mentioned them, using both Sharpedo and Yanmega on my team to great effect. I agree its strange to see them so low, but there arent many in the current top 30 I wouldn't have similar feelings towards were the positions switched (maybe Ambipom or Umbreon).

Funny you mentioned them, using both Sharpedo and Yanmega on my team to great effect. I agree its strange to see them so low, but there arent many in the current top 30 I wouldn't have similar feelings towards were the positions switched (maybe Ambipom or Umbreon).

However, Sharpedo at 48 seems a true waste.

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I agree with Ambipom, but foul play Umbreon means that huge threats that don't resist it can't switch in to kill it. It's really strong imo.

I'm at about ~1550 right now, not sure if I can go much higher in time so I guess I'll just go in depth about my team and what I've found so far.

There are actually a lot of options in the UU tier here, starting with Gligar and going down to most things lower than that on the speed tier list. The biggest threat really is that all of the good responses to Bulky Water types are basically gone. In order to beat them, I decided to start with a combo of Lanturn and entry hazards. Both Froslass and Quilfish are available to Spike. Both are perfectly viable, and Quilfish is a neat Heracross check, but I go with Froslass because of Taunt and high Speed. Fast Taunt helps me against Mew, Azelf, and the like, especially since I don't really want Rocks up for this team.

Lanturn is okay but it's not as great as I had hoped. Its main problem is that it can't hurt ANYTHING at all. It's useful for Waters, Raikou, and Tornadus in particular. I put Scald / Discharge / IB / Toxic on it, with the idea that it is always going to threaten some kind of status on something. Toxic helps against stuff like Suicune, forcing it to Rest earlier. Still don't have much that can beat it, but it helps.

I added Rhyperior for Rocks and also to help against random threats. Rhyperior shouldn't be below 30 in usage. It's really that simple. I can get Rocks up with it fairly easily and generally pose an offensive threat to anything.

Rounding out the defensive core is Rotom-H. Actually the last Pokemon on my team, what I didn't realize is just how useful Specs Rotom is. I would actually argue it is at least on par with Chandelure. For one thing, it is a flawless Raikou switch in. Resists BoltBeam, HP Grass, Signal Beam. Seriously, Raikou can't do shit to it. Substitute can be a problem, so I'm considering running something (HP Ground? idk) over Trick on it, but usually I can threaten it out somehow anyway. Another plus is Levitate. It can come in on anything Gligar normally runs for example and immediately present an offensive threat to the team.

My offensive threat #1 is Specs Tinted Lens Yanmega. I alternate between this and Froslass for lead, because the SR weak is a tremendous problem, but also because most teams don't have anything that can really take a Bug Buzz. Zapdos is the most common answer who takes 30-40% from it, but is even bigger Rotom fodder than Raikou, plus it doesn't have Rocks so I can potentially bring Yanmega in on Gligar or Claydol or whatever is Rocking for another go. It is also a Heracross check with the 4x resist to both of his STAB moves and Air Slash in my back pocket.

Unfortunately Yanmega exposes a big weakness in this format's restrictions: Absolutely no viable Spinners. Claydol is dog shit, and the next best option is fucking Hitmonlee. I decided not to bother and to introduce another frail sweeper instead of making a slower bulky team: Speed Boost Sharpedo. What a fucking boss. One Protect and it beats any Scarfer except Flygon (lol). I bring this in late game, maybe on a Volt Switch from Rotom or after a death, and it's like Moxie Heracross except with boosting Speed. You can take out a lot with its moveset, and it's almost always faster anyway. Psychic immunity is really really handy against a Mew or something - you come in on the Psychic, Protect on the Aura Sphere, and then Crunch for the KO.

Overall this team has been really fun and actually more successful than my old UU team. Lemme know if anyone else in this challenge wants help or suggestions.

I have right now 1541 with 12 wins and 7 loses. Pretty decent. The hardest thing is that i hardly manage to play against water types (especially bulky ones). All I can do is to revenge kill them with ChoiceSpecs Rotom-H.

Well , half of my team is SR weak , good thing I have Taunt Froslass that helps me to stop hazards and spikes support is really useful. Because of that Froslass is my lead most of times.

Rhyperior is also awsome for walling Raikou and setting up rocks.

SubRoost Honchkrow is so awsome , is walled only by steel types , but there aren't that many in UU.

And because I wanted a Heracross check , i picked Duscops. Lol JK. I used Dusknoir , because is the bulkiest Ghost type avalaible in this challenge and that...doesn't suck so bad? Is surprisingly good. A lot of teams are unprepared for SubPunch Dusknoir and they usually sent out their Umbreon against me. Also priority in Shadow Sneak is nice for more dmg and Will-O-Wisp is crippling physical attackers so they will not break my Sub so easy , plus a second spinblocker is always nice.

Also Sharpedo with Spikes an SR support is really great , cleaning really good weakened teams.

lol yeah i'm totally retarded. just having overheat is a bit limiting, but it's still baller.

Allen - IMO the best thing for Heracross available is probably Gligar, but Yanmega, a proper Mismagius, or even Quilfish are respectable checks. You just need something that can take a single hit and something faster than non scarf variants and you can hold it together. For example, I have Froslass, Yanmega, and Sharpedo that all together handle Heracross in varying forms and capacities. This kind of "creative checking" is one of the neatest parts of the challenge and is good practice for building a highly offensive team.

Rotom-C is a good Water response, absolutely. I think there are a few others being overlooked. Some dude used an Amoongus on me which was actually pretty threatening. There's a bazillion other Grass types that aren't Roserade but still okay.

Ok, a bit of feedback. Managed to get a little streak pushing me up to a peak of 1749 (no evidence, sorry guys, so I don't expect it to go up on the leaderboard) on PS! using a team of scarf pory-z, froslass, gligar, machamp, rotom-c, and houndoom.

It actually wasn't all that bad despite being completely creamed by togekiss. Houndoom, while its role is quite small in the tier and it is walled by a lot (was running all out mixed attacker), is still a really good ghost killer thanks to its immunity to will-o-wisp and taking down victini and chandy is a really nice bonus too. Not amazing, but definitely not a waste of a slot. Rotom-c was ok. It didn't really get a chance to do much though in all the games I played with it, so it may well be better. Machamp was actually not half-bad. Any team that lacks a ghost type will often be fumbling to find a way to counter it because of that 130 Base attack and dangerous coverage. Take down those psychics and ghosts (houndoom's job) and it can actually perform very decently. Gligar is awesome as I think we all know and I imagine every team is using either him or rhyperior. Froslass is also great and makes a very nice hazard-core with either of the former two. Very efficient at getting spikes up early, I'd say the best in the tier at that job so I'm a little surprised she's so low. Scarfed Porygon-Z was a bit lack luster to be honest. Didn't have the bulk or typing to switch in often and once it did, it was only to be walled by something thanks to all its movepool consisting of pretty weak viable moves and normal is not a good type to be spamming.